A Lasting Donation
by foreverHenry919
Summary: Henry's refusal to donate a kidney to Mike and Karen Hanson's ailing young son places a wedge between the two colleagues. Eventually, he agrees to do it but insists they have all the facts about him and his condition before they decide to accept.
1. A Lasting Donation Ch 1

The scene is a doctor's office in midtown Manhatten where the worried parents of a 13-year-old boy sit anxiously in the waiting room, clutching each other's hands and doing their best to encourage each other with pained smiles.

"What are we gonna do, Mike?" his wife, Karen, asked, fighting back tears. "What if we lose him?"

Mike patted her hand and hugged her close with his free arm. "Hey, none of that, remember? We wait and see what the doctor has to say." He kissed her on the side of her head and reminded her, "The kid's strong. And he's determined to beat this. So you and I," he said, wagging a finger back and forth between them, "have to remain strong for him."

Karen attempted a brighter smile but it faltered. "I'm not as strong as the two of you are."

"Oh, yes, you are, lady," Mike replied, grinning. "You were strong enough to bag me, weren't you? And keep me all these years. And you were strong enough to get the boys and me to eat Brussel sprouts, so Wonder Woman in my book." He laughed and hugged her again as that got a genuine laugh out of her.

"I just hope - hope that he doesn't need a kidney transplant," she said. "There's all that medication a person has to take to prevent organ rejection." She sighed and added, "And I hope he _can_ have one. At least it will help him to keep living." She vigorously shook her head full of short, blonde curls. "Oh, I'm not making much sense right now, am I?"

"You make perfect sense," he softly replied. "Can't tell you some of the crazy thoughts that cross my mind sometimes about all of this."

"Dr. Morgan?" Karen asked cautiously and he nodded grimly in response. "Well ... he can't be the only one compatible with Mikey. In this whole country, this whole world, he's the only one who can donate a kidney to our son?! There simply has to be someone else out there. Someone willing," she added. Try as she might, she couldn't stop her anger from building against the ME who worked so diligently with her husband and the NYPD, helping so many others find a resolution but refusing to help their son!

"New donors are being added to the database every day, honey," Mike told her in an effort to calm her. "But if I could, I'd rip that kidney out of him, myself and ... " his voice trailed off in frustration.

"With your bare hands?" she teasingly asked.

"Yeah," he quietly replied, nodding his head up and down and then releasing a sigh of frustration. "Just don't understand why he won't help us. I know he wants to. Really wants to but ... he keeps saying that he _can't_."

Karen studied her husband for a few moments, then said, "Make you a deal. When you decide to rip his kidney out, I wanna be there, too." When Mike frowned at her, trying to convince himself that she was kidding but doubting that she was, she clarified her request. "Have to make sure it's properly packaged and promptly transported."

Just then, the inner door to the waiting room opened and a medical assistant in scrubs stood there with a clipboard. "The doctor will see you in his office now, Mr. and Mrs. Hanson," she told them.

They followed the MA along the beehive of corridors, it seemed, until they reached the doctor's surprisingly small office. For the next 45 minutes, they listened to him explain that their son's plastic catheter that had been surgically inserted into his abdominal cavity was failing. They already knew that his catheter served as a passage for dialysate, a fluid that assists in cleansing the blood from waste products. But only five months after surgery, it had performed poorly and was now failing.

It had all sounded like Greek when the doctor, Dr. Winthrop, had first explained Mikey's diagnosis, the course of treatment, and prognosis to them. Like Greek from a bad movie. But after hours of personal research out of pure necessity, the medical terminology had risen up off of the pages and shaken off its cloak of mumbo-jumbo. They now knew more than they wished to about kidney failure in children and still not enough to help their son.

"After all that bad news," Dr. Winthrop said, "the good news is that your son has moved up on the donee list." The doctor sighed and leaned back in his chair. "Wish the news could be better. Any luck finding a donor among your circle of family or friends?"

Mike and Karen exchanged a look then, Mike sighed and replied, "Uh, no. No luck."

As they left the building and got into their car, Mike responded to Karen's unspoken plea. "I'll talk to Henry again." He angrily wrenched the key in the ignition and the car thrummed to life.

The next morning in the OCME ...

"The stab wounds in the back confirm what the blood trail indicates: the victim was fleeing her assailant. The heel of one of her shoes broke, she stumbled and fell, and was overpowered by her assailant," Henry stated confidently but noted that Mike was uncharacteristically distracted. He had a pretty good idea of what was on the detective's mind because the same thing was on his own mind making it difficult for him to remain focused on this poor victim of a vicious knife attack.

"Couldn't she have been stabbed, then stumbled away, fallen and bled out where we found her?" Jo asked. Although painfully aware of the tension between her two crime-solving partners, she knew it was important to concentrate on the victim in front of them. She was glad that they both were maintaining a professional attitude today, unlike their last interaction that had deteriorated into a shouting match requiring two unis to pull them apart.

Jo simply couldn't believe what she'd witnessed. The two men hadn't developed a particularly close relationship during the past few years they'd all worked together but she never imagined she'd ever see Mike look at Henry with such anger in his eyes over Henry's refusal to donate a kidney to his young son. Even though she knew the reason behind Henry's refusal, she and Abe had not been able to convince the Immortal to at least try.

 _"You don't understand. Whenever I die, everything disappears," he'd told Abe and her, chopping the air with a hand as he'd spoken. "Everything on my person and any blood or human matter. Anyone walking around that I had donated to might suddenly finds themselves lacking a vital organ."_

 _"Might, Henry, might," Jo had emphasized to him. "You don't know for sure if that would happen."_

 _"Yeah, Pops. Your watch always seems to survive your disappearances," Abe had offered as an example._

 _"All thanks to a faulty fob that causes it to leave my person in those ... unfortunate moments," Henry had replied. He then went on to point out that all of the blood samples he'd provided as part of a routine procedure to eliminate crime scene contamination had also disappeared. "Why do you think that happened?" he'd asked. "No. I can't do it. I won't."_

 _"Their son will die without a new kidney, Henry," Jo had told him again. "Besides, your blood samples, along with many others, had been stolen, remember? We got the weirdos who confessed to having illegally sold them to research labs."_

 _"Except none of my blood samples were ever recovered," he reminded her. "No. I simply can't chance to donate my kidney to him, Jo. It would be tantamount to murder for me to do so," he still contended._

 _"To Mike and his wife, since they don't know the real reason behind your refusal to donate, it will also be tantamount to murder in their eyes if you don't," Jo had pointed out._

The ME's voice brought her back to the present when she heard him reply to her hypothetical question.

"No, the blood trail clearly shows that she was moving at a faster pace than simply stumbling. And these 23 stab wounds indicate that this crime was personal," Henry said.

"For real," Lucas scoffed.

"She was trying desperately to get away from her attacker. But look here," Henry said, flicking his head toward the victim's mouth, cradling her chin with both hands. "This cut lip wound was made probably after a disagreement but before the knife attack. The blow not only knocked her #11 Canine tooth out of its socket in the upper left quadrant, it caused her to swallow it."

"Hmmm," Mike said. "Person who hit her should have a corresponding wound on their hand."

"Quite correct, Detective," Henry said. "The human mouth contains more than 6 billion bacteria and would have immediately invaded the cut on the hand, possibly infecting it."

"Okay," Jo said. "We'll round up the usual suspects and check out which one recently delivered a knuckle sandwich."

Mike pulled his buzzing phone out of his pocket and checked the text message he'd just received. A cloud of worry passed over his face as he read it. "Uh, sorry guys, I gotta go. My kid." He hurried out of the morgue.

As they all watched Mike leave, Lucas buried his head into his chest as he made notations on the clipboard he was holding. He stole a glance at Jo and her silent, pleading gaze at Henry, who appeared to be trying to avoid it. Lucas cleared his throat and said, "Excuse me, Doc. She goes back into the cooler now?"

"Oh, yes, yes," Henry replied.

"Guess I'll go round up those usual suspects," Jo said. "Care to join me?" she asked Henry.

A soft smile of gratitude spread over his face. "Let me get my coat and scarf." He was thankful for the distraction from worrying about Mike and his ill son but also because Jo had not shut him out of fieldwork ... or her life.

vvvv

"Always good to get a perp to confess without having to grill them or take off in hot pursuit in order to nab them," Jo said. "Simple. Mike loves simple." When Henry failed to respond, she looked at him as they stood by her assigned vehicle.

"We nab the right guy?" she asked.

"Oh, yes," he quickly replied, forcing a smile. "I'm sure that the shape of the wound on the knuckle of his right ring finger will match perfectly with the victim's tooth she'd swallowed. The toxicology reports should also show the victim's bacteria-laden saliva and her blood in his wound."

"Sounds gross but promising," Jo replied, grimacing. She studied him for a moment or two, realizing that his concentration was elsewhere. After nudging him on the arm, they got into the car and she started it up. "I still have a lot of paperwork to complete for this case. Back to the morgue for you or to the shop?"

"Well," he began uncertainly. "I suppose ... " He shut his eyes and laid his head back into the headrest, sighing. "It's hard to concentrate, Jo. I simply can't ... " He opened his eyes and pursed his lips.

"Henry, I ... " She just didn't know what to say to him anymore. It was his decision to make. And yet she couldn't get little Mikey's cute little face in that hospital bed out of her mind. His parents' worried faces out of her mind.

"Jo. I've come to a decision regarding this troubling matter," Henry suddenly told her. "But I'll need both Abraham and you to help me."

Startled but happy, she looked at him and asked, "Help you do what?" She prayed that she was right in her unvoiced assumption.

"I am willing to donate one of my kidneys to young Mikey. But first I need to explain to them why for so long I had refused. They need to have all the facts before they decide to accept my offer."

"Oh, Henry, that's great!" Jo exclaimed, grabbing his hand and raising it almost in victory and squeezing it. "Of course, Abe and I will help you all we can. Mike and Karen will be so happy!"

"In the end, though, I suppose it will be Mikey's decision."

"Ohhh, Henry, now, he's just a kid."

"Jo, he's old enough to understand and weigh in on how all of this might affect his health and possibly his life."

"But 12, Henry."

"He's actually 13, according to Mike; only two years younger than Abraham was when he found out about my condition," he explained. "Children are so much more mature and open-minded about things nowadays." He gave her a determined look and added, "It's the only way."


	2. A Lasting Donation Ch 2

Despite some misgivings, Henry decides to donate one of his kidneys to the young Hanson boy. He sincerely hopes that he's made the right decision.

Jo was already on her phone to Mike to alert him of Henry's change of heart. "Oh. Okay. See you in a few." She ended the call, stepped on the gas, and activated the siren. "They're at the hospital," she said, the worry in her voice controlled but evident. "Thank God you changed your mind in time to help him."

As they rushed toward Presbyterian Hospital, they both realized that there wouldn't be enough time to tell the Hanson's anything about Henry and his condition. Only moments after they'd arrived, the hospital staff took over and quickly prepped Henry for the removal of his kidney. Jo called Abe to let him know what was going on and then joined Mike and Karen in the small waiting area. Abe closed up the shop and joined them as soon as he could. Three hours later, Dr. Winthrop informed them that the surgery and transplant had been successful.

"They're in recovery but the prognosis is good for both of them," Dr. Winthrop said. He sighed and gave them a weary but happy smile.

"How soon can we see our son?" Karen asked.

The doctor explained that their son's progress needed to first be monitored for any signs of organ rejection. "Once he truly appears stabilized, we'll let you know," he replied. "But, hopefully, you should be able to visit him by this time tomorrow." They thanked him and he turned his attention to Abe and Jo.

"Dr. Morgan is a hearty specimen and is recovering well," he told them. "Plan on visiting him tomorrow at this same time, as well." They thanked him and the doctor left the waiting area.

"Well," Abe blew out, "good news all around, looks like."

A much relieved and smiling Mike and Karen hugged each other. "What made him change his mind all of a sudden?" Mike asked Abe. "I mean, I'm glad that he did but he was so against it for so long."

"You ... know Henry," Jo falteringly replied with an equally faltering smile.

Abe shrugged with his own more genuine smile and reminded him, "But it all worked out in the end, right?" The others nodded and he invited them all over to the shop for dinner. Mike and Karen at first begged off because they had to pick up their younger son, Donny, from school.

"Bring him, too!" Abe happily encouraged them. "We're connected now. Family."

vvvv

It was 9:33 AM the morning after the surgery and transplant operations. Henry closed his eyes and assessed his own condition, enumerating his symptoms to himself and issued a positive prognosis for his recovery. He tried hard to concentrate on the talk show airing on the TV in an effort to ignore his doubts about having donated a kidney to the Hanson boy. It was too late now, though, he realized. Now, if he could just manage to stay alive for the duration of the boy's lifetime. He muted the TV when Dr. Winthrop appeared at the foot of his bed.

"How are we feeling today?" Dr. Winthrop asked.

Henry laughed to himself at the doctor's addressing him as 'we'. "Fine, Dr. Winthrop, thank you."

The doctor opened the file he was holding, reading it as he slowly drew closer to Henry's bedside. He then closed the file and met Henry's gaze. "I'll check in on you later today but most likely you'll be able to go home tomorrow."

Henry smiled and nodded, recalling a time when a patient could expect to spend a week or more in the hospital after surgery. "How is young Hanson doing?"

"Came through like a trooper," Dr. Winthrop replied. "Oh, Doctor, would you mind telling me how you got that terrible looking scar on your chest?"

Henry gulped before replying, "I was young. Very young." He actually had been much younger. More than 200 years younger.

"So, you can't really say how you got it," Dr. Winthrop stated, assuming that Henry had been a very small child or even a baby when the injury had occurred.

"No, I really can't," Henry replied. It was the truth, though. He really couldn't say anything about it to anyone other than Jo or Abe.

"Your parents never told you how you got that scar?" he asked, frowning.

"No. Never," Henry replied. Again, it was the truth. Neither of his parents was even alive when he'd experienced his first death.

Dr. Winthrop looked at him consideringly, then nodded and left. Abe and Jo showed up right after and visited with him for a while.

vvvv

Three months later ...

"Dad, I think this is the longest you've gone in a while not, uh, you know," Abe remarked after dinner one evening. "Congratulations on being so extra careful."

Henry sighed before replying. "Yes, but ... Abe, this is eating away at me not telling them about the possible consequences of Mike, Jr., having my kidney in him. Mike is so proud of his son participating in little league again."

A spark of remembrance lit up in Abe's eyes and he raised a hand, sitting forward in his chair. "Wait. Do you recall telling me that a small piece of Adam's skin was found embedded in a ring worn by one of his victim's? That, that guy at the bank he tortured and killed."

"Yes, yes, yes, ah, Julian Glauser," Henry replied.

"A physical part of him that had survived after he'd offed himself to escape the crime scene," Abe pointed out. "Mike's kid is gonna be okay with your kidney in him."

"Why couldn't I remember that?" Henry wondered aloud.

"You were just too worried about the kid, Pops," Abe quietly reminded him. "But now you won't have to reveal your secret to them, the kid is healthy, and everybody's happy, right?"

vvvv

The next day Henry received even further proof that a physical part of him would survive after one of his deaths. While sitting behind his office desk in the morgue working on a report, photos were suddenly plopped down in front of him. Surprised, he looked up to see a smilingly pleased Jo Martinez standing on the other side of his desk.

"Hello, Detective, and, ah, what are these?" he asked.

"Crime scene photos," she replied. "Specifically, photos from inside a home in the Bronx in which several refrigerators and chest freezers full of stolen organs, bags of blood, and tubes of blood samples were found." She placed her index finger on one of the photos. "Including _your_ blood samples," she proudly announced.

Henry shook his head, pleasantly astonished. "I always assumed ... well, this is proof positive that a physical part of _me_ would survive after one of my, ah, departures."

"So, no more worries about Mikey," Jo told him as they exchanged broad smiles. Her smile faded as she checked her phone and put it away. "DB in the basement of that same house." Henry traded his lab coat for his top coat and scarf, joining Jo and Mike as they raced to the crime scene.

vvvv

The threesome made their way down the narrow staircase that led into the basement. The smell of decomp hit them hard in the small, musky area, prompting Jo and Mike to cover their noses with masks provided by the CSI Unit when they'd first arrived. They watched Henry in disbelief as he not only opted to use the mask but inhaled deeply several times as they slowly surveyed the small room.

"The body was found in that old steamer trunk over there," Mike said, pointing to it. "No ID yet and no telling how long it had been there. But they got the body out of here already. Why does it still smell like it's still here?"

"Because there's another one down here," Henry grimly replied. His eyes zeroed in on a small, drawer-like compartment inside the steamer trunk. He tugged at it with a gloved hand and pulled it open. The stench of death suddenly increased as the remains of a small child not quite a year old was revealed. Henry finally put his mask on and they all eyed the grim discovery with great sadness.

"What's this?" Mike asked, peering at a maple wood coffin-shaped box about the same size as the compartment that contained the child's body. "You don't think ... ?" He cautiously approached it, frowning, and reached out to tug it open when Henry noticed the glint from an almost invisible string of fishing line attached to the box's handle.

"No!" Henry shouted, pushing Mike out of the way. The box snapped open and there were a spark and the sound of a discharge. Henry felt a painful, burning sensation in his chest near the bottom of his scar. He realized that the fishing line was part of a trip-wire booby trap that had propelled a small caliber bullet into him. Since he and Mike were about the same height, Henry knew that the bullet would have hit the detective in the same spot. He also knew that his wound was fatal but unlike the detective, he would die and return.

Consciousness was leaving him and he felt himself being lowered to the floor. As he lay there he could hear Mike cursing under his breath.

"Geez, Doc! I'm callin' for a bus!"

"Don't!" Jo told him, surprising him by snatching his phone away from him. She was already on her phone calling Abe. Mike began to argue with her.

"It's okay, Mike," he managed to say. "I'll ... be back. Cover ... for me, Jo." She tearfully nodded as his eyes glazed over staring sightlessly at the ceiling.

Mike cursed again out of frustration when he realized that Henry's life had ended. But when they heard his last exhale and saw his body vanish in a flash of ultra-white light, he could only stand and gape at the empty space where Henry's body no longer lay.

"Holy ... Mother of - "

Jo quickly wiped her tears away with one hand and said, "He was going to tell you."

"Whaddya mean? Tell me what?" Mike demanded.

"No time," she replied as she ran out of the side door and up the concrete stairs in the small backyard space. Mike was right behind her asking where she was headed.

"The East River," she breathlessly replied as they piled in and drove away in her car, "to get Henry."

While Jo drove with a speechless Mike beside her, she called to alert the crime scene personnel to avoid the basement for now and let the bomb squad clear the entire house because there might be more booby traps in it. She drove to the river as quickly as she could without sirens.

They reached the spot near the East River of Henry's many past arrests for public nudity after Abe had managed to retrieve him. When they arrived, they saw Abe's car driving away with a familiar-looking passenger drying his hair with a towel. At the sight of him, Mike gasped his name out in awe and Jo heaved a sigh of relief. They followed Abe to the shop and parked the car, hurriedly exiting it and jogging up into the shop.

vvvv

"This happens to you, this dying and ... vanishing and ... wow, uh ... " Mike didn't know exactly how to end that sentence.

"Which is why for so long I refused to donate any part of my body to your son or anyone else, for that matter," Henry replied. "Everything disappears when I die. Blood, matter, everything," he animatedly clarified. "If my kidney in your son's body would vanish whenever I died again ... " His voice trailed off as he shuddered. "I thought that it could cause him to die instantly, as well." He took in a deep breath and exhaled. "Fortunately, I was wrong," he admitted and sipped from his wine glass.

Mike began to smile then laugh softly, shaking his head. When Jo asked what was so funny, he replied, "I found out before Lucas did. He would probably cry like a baby if he knew," he added, laughing louder with the others joining in.

Having finished his glass of wine, Henry rose from his chair and announced to them all, "Now, if you will all excuse me, I must go shower and change into some more suitable attire." He nodded slightly and left the room.

"Your ... Dad's quite a guy," Mike told Abe.

"That he is, Detective. That he is." Abe quickly rose to his feet and faced him and Jo with clasped hands and a mischevious smile. "Now, if I could only get the stick out of his - "

"A-bra-hammm - " Henry's warning voice interrupted as it drifted in from the hallway.

"Oh, c'mon, Pops!" Abe called back to him. "Mike can teach you some New York, tough guy slang and help me and Jo - "

"Jo and me ... " Henry's voice sing-songed back, correcting him.

"Me and Jo!" Abe defiantly replied. He then turned a weary expression to the two detectives, made the shape of a square in the air with his fingers while mockingly lamenting, "My old man."

vvvv

Over the next ten years, young Mike Hanson, Jr., grew up healthy and strong to manhood, finished college, and followed in the footsteps of his father by joining the NYPD. He and his parents were forever grateful to Henry and to keep his secret hidden, his doctors never knew that he only pretended to take the prescribed medication to prevent organ rejection. From time to time, he would visit his donor, the Immortal medical man, whom he knew would outlive them all.

Notes:

The dead bodies found in the basement (which should have been in a chest freezer) were of a man and a toddler who'd had their organs farmed for profit before the perpetrator(s) realized that selling stolen organs and blood was easier than kidnapping people and killing them. Really icky business.

Information about transplants, suppression medication for organ rejection, and organ storage were found on the Internet.


	3. A Lasting Donation Ch 3 A Few More Notes

With the help of Henry's perpetually healthy donated kidney, he lived to the astoundingly old age of 123 - even though by all accounts, he didn't look a day over 100 - and was heralded as the world's oldest living man. Of course, he and his perpetually-youthful looking donor, Henry Morgan, knew better. But they also knew that they could/should never reveal that truth to the world. And when his other organs began to fail, the doctors had no explanation for the pristine condition of his kidney, donated to him over 110 years earlier. He died in his sleep after having made provisions for the kidney to be donated.

The grateful recipient, also one of the last persons to have a transplant in the usual manner, was a 32-year-old mother of two from Zimbabwe. She had journeyed to New York in order to take advantage of the much-needed treatment. Thankfully, sweeping advances in regenerative medicine, the human body's ability to heal and restore the normal function of damaged tissues and organs, had fast rendered the usual transplant method obsolete.

His memorial service, attended by thousands had not only been broadcast worldwide but to the astronauts in the ISS and to the internationally-occupied outposts on both Mars and the Moon. Henry wondered if these new advances in medicine would allow mortals to manufacture longer life spans for themselves, rendering Adam, him, and a handful of other "regular" Immortals obsolete, as well? But, Henry wondered, would someone like Adam be willing to share their heretofore less-trodden path of a long life? Henry was certain that he, himself, would welcome others to his "side" of life especially if it meant more time having friends and loved ones around. He recalled something that his dearly-departed son, Abraham, had told him once; something about evolving.

"We'll just have to learn to evolve, Adam," he had recently told the older Immortal, who had shaken off his locked-in syndrome only 50 years earlier. For the first time in his long life, Henry looked forward to evolving in this new future.

Notes:

Added as a promise to Ken H.

Information about stem cells and Regenerative Medicine found on anova website.


End file.
